Scenes From the Bathhouse - Over three dozen short-short stories and one novella collected here, all flowing from the pen of Mikhail Zoshchenko, one of the great 20th century satirists, the most widely read writer in Russia during his lifetime but a writer expelled from the Union of Soviet Writers and eventually banned from the Russian press. Also included in the volume is an excellent introductory essay by Sidney Monas providing biographical information and cultural and literary context for the author’s writing.
These tales of everyday life in Soviet Russia are very, very funny. Sure, as Sidney Monas is quick to point out, the more Zoshchenko one reads, the more pathos and depth one will unearth; however, first and foremost, it bears repeating, comrades, these brief sketches are simply hilarious. So, for the purposes of my review, I’ll quickly move to a pair of stories as a way of trotting out a bit of Zoshchenko comedy and wit.
THE ACTOR
Here’s my brief retelling of the way Vasia tells it. People crowd around him and ask: “Vasia, where you an actor?” Vasia lets them know he was indeed an actor and played around in the theater. But he goes on to say how it was simply nonsense; there’s nothing outstanding in being an actor – you go out on stage and your family and friends in the audience signal their encouragement from the cheap seats and you signal back all is under control and everything will be just fine. And that's that.
Once Vasia performed in Who Is To Blame?, a powerful play where in one act bandits rob a merchant in the middle of the stage, right there in plain sight of everyone sitting in the theater. But before one particular evening’s performance, the actor who played the merchant got blotto drunk. The bum couldn’t act; all he could do was go out on stage and kick the footlights.
Director Ivan Palych insisted Vasia take the part of merchant in the second act since, after all, the people in the audience are too dumb to know the difference. “I can’t,” said Vasia, “I’m full. I just stuffed myself with two whole melons.” Ivan Palych pleaded, “Just for one scene. Please don’t tear down the world of cultural enlightenment.” Vasia said, “Ok, ok, I’ll do it but just for one scene.” So Vasia goes out on stage wearing his own shirt and pants and with a false beard but his family and friends in the audience recognize him on the spot. “Hey, Vasia, give us some good acting!” Vasia lets them know he had to take over since the artiste playing the merchant is blotto.
So the scene starts. Hey, wait a minute! It appears one of the actors is going through Vasia’s pockets for real. Vasia isn’t about to be robbed for real and gives the actors playing the bandits each a punch in the chops. “Get away from me, you swine,” hollers Vasia “I ask you as a true gentleman.” But the bandit actors don’t hold back – they take Vasia’s wallet and reach for his watch. Valia cries out, “Help, Help, citizens! These guys are robbing me for real!” The audience loves every second of the drama and goes wild with cheers and applauds. Valia lashes out again, gives one of the bandits a bloody nose. From offstage, Ivan Palych shouts encouragement: “Way to go, Vasia! Keep it up!
Vasia understands yelling and punching will do no good. He gets down on his knees right there on stage; “I’ve had it, brothers. Drop the curtain. They’ve stolen my last penny. For real.” The prompter can see Vasia’s lines are not the lines from the play and comes up on the stage: “It looks like those bandits really did rob him, for real.” The curtain drops. They bring poor Vasia some water. Between panting breaths, he says: “What the hell is going on? Those guys really did steal my wallet.”
All the actors playing the bandits were searched as well as the entire theater – they found Vasia’s empty wallet but the money was never recovered. So Vasia tells his friends he knows all about art and acting and theater. Never again!
THE BATHHOUSE
This story is told by an unnamed first-person narrator I’ll call Zosh and retell the story in compressed form. Here goes: Zosh says bathhouses are not so bad – you can wash yourself, no problem. Only there is this problem with the tickets. Case in point: Last Saturday he went to the bathhouse and they gave him two tickets, one for his shirt, pants, shoes and socks and one for his hat and coat. But where, Zosh wonders, is a naked man going to put tickets? Damn! A naked man is all bare stomach and legs. And you certainly can’t tie them to your beard. Oh, well. Zosh took string and tied a ticket to each leg so he wouldn’t lose both at once.
So the tickets are flapping around on Zosh’s legs but Zosh walks on to look for a bucket to wash himself. He spots one citizen washing himself with three buckets – standing in one, washing his head with the second and holding a third so someone else can't take it away. Zoch pulls at the guy’s third bucket but the guy refuses to let go and tells him: “Hey, what are you up to, trying to steal my bucket?” Zoch again pulls at the bucket and the guy yells: “I’ll give you a bucket between the eyes and you won’t be so damn happy.” Zosh replies: “This isn’t the tsarist regime. You can’t go around hitting people with buckets. After all, other people have to wash too. You’re not in the theater.” But the guy turns his back and continues washing. Zosh moves along.
An hour later Zosh sees some old joker gaping about, looking for soap and Zosh quickly makes off with the geezer’s bucket. All right, now that he has his bucket, he looks for a place to sit down. Damn! There isn't one empty bench where he can plop his ass; he’ll have to wash standing up. But double damn! Everyone is splattering dirty water all over the place – no sooner do you wash yourself then you’re dirty. “To hell with you all,” Zoch cries out, “I’ll finish washing at home.” Zoch goes back to the locker room, presents his ticket and gets a pair of pants with a hole in the left leg. He tells them they’ve given him the wrong pants; his pants have a hole in the right leg not the left. The attendant replies: “We aren’t here just to watch for your holes. You’re not in the theater.”
All right, all right, Zoch thinks and puts on the pants. He then goes over for his coat. They want to see his ticket. Damn! He has to take his pants off to get to the ticket but then he discovers: no ticket. Zoch tries to give the attendant the string but the attendant doesn’t want the string and tells Zach he’ll just have to wait until everyone leaves and he can have the one coat remaining. Zoch says this isn’t the theater and explains how that’s hardly fair and goes on to describe his own coat in detail. Finally, they handed him his own coat.
Zoch walks out but then remembers: he forgot his soap! He returns to the bathhouse but they won’t let him in wearing a coat. “Undress,” they order. Zoch replies: “Hey, this isn’t the theater. At least give me what my soap costs.”
“Nothing doing, brother!”
“All right, all right, I’ll go without my soap.”
I chortle and ask, "Hey Zosh. What kind of bathhouse are we talking about here? Zoch answers: “The usual kind. Where it costs ten kopecks to get in.”
Photo of Russian author Mikhail Zoshchenko, 1894-1958
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